28 THE FLOWERS

sitting one afternoon with my window open,
it being two days before the feast of Easter,
that I saw the young people proceeding in a
body from the porch; Mademoiselle Victoire
was in the midst of them, and she was talking
with great vivacity on a subject which seemed
to interest every one. They advanced in a
direction which brought them nearly under
my window, and then Mademoiselle sat down
on a garden chair in the centre of the grass
plat, whilst her two favourites stationed them-
selves on each side of her, and one by one
she called each of the other young people to
the footstool of her throne, for she sat in
much state, and after having looked into the
palm of every hand with the grimaces used
by a fortune teller, for so I understood the
scene, she dismissed each individual with some’*
prognostic or witticism, which, as 1 perceived,
excited peals of laughter, but not such laugh-
ter as I felt agreeable to me. It appears that
the young people had at that moment forgot-
ten that it was possible I might be so near
them; for although I could see them well,
and distinguish every gesture, yet I was
myself so concealed by a jessamine just
bursting into leaf, which I had trained over a